Here I will transcribe the journals from my
travels starting with how I discovered Lemuria and Azmerith.

On the day it all began I wrote the following
in a small spiral notebook:

June 20, 1999:

I have decided that the best thing
for my birthday this year will be a climb of Mount Shasta. Rich was
supposed to meet me at Bunny Flat but never showed up. You know what? That
really pissed me off. I decided the hell with taking the easy way up,
drove down the mountain and along the northern skirt to the town of Weed.

I parked the truck on an old
logging road and shouldered my pack.

June 21, 1999:

I should be writing that I successfully climbed the mountain. Instead,
I'm sitting in this cave, writing by flashlight, wondering if I'll get out
of this alive. If anyone finds this journal, please tell my family that I
love them and was thinking of them before the end. Tell them what
happened: I was climbing on Mount Shasta near the summit when the snow
suddenly broke under me and I fell into a deep crevasse on the glacier.
I've broken my left leg. The sides are ice. I'm about 100 feet down. My ice axe was ripped from my hand during the fall and
I can see it, still stuck in the ice of the crevasse, too high for me to reach.
I tried to climb out but the ice is slick. I have only my Swiss Army knife
as a tool and am trying to chip out some steps. Maybe I'll get out
tomorrow.

Funny thing is:
there's a cave. The bottom of the crevasse has an exposed rocky area, part
of the mountain. I found a small opening in the rock, just wide enough to
crawl through and inside it's dry. I don't know how deep it goes in but it
must go deep into the core of the volcano because it's warm. At least I
won't freeze to death!

June 22, 1999:

Spent the night inside the cave. Tried cutting more steps to get out of
the crevasse. I wonder if anyone will come. I yelled and yelled but don't
know why. I was not on the usual route for climbers. Ate my last Power
Bar. Six steps dug before the big blade of my knife broke. Not enough
progress to get me out anytime soon. I hope someone out there misses me
but I told my family I was going to climb the regular route. It might be a
week before they find my truck on the forest service road and figure out
I'm in this side of the mountain.

June 23, 1999:

If you
are reading this all I can say is how sorry I am. We had a beautiful life
together but I had to go on this stupid adventure. I'm sorry for every
mean thing I ever said to you. I just want you to know how much I love you
and am grateful for the all you did, I'm feeling weak now, am probably
dehydrated because there's no water in the crevasse. I have no way to melt
the ice but one lighter, I am chipping steps but the progress is slow. The
ice is super hard down deep in the crevasse, I don't know if I'll have
enough steps to get out before death catches up.

June 24, 1999:

Chipped out five new steps. Tried climbing up but slipped off and
fell about fifteen feet. I can feel warm air rising from the cave at the
bottom of the glacier and am thinking of exploring deeper to find if
there's any other way out. Maybe there's melted water in the cave. My flashlight has two batteries and no spares
so I will turn around if the light begins to weaken.

June 25, 1999:

This is really strange. I
reached the end of the cave. It was about 300 feet deep. There's a chamber
here with a flat floor and domed ceiling. Someone else had been there. I
found a girl's pink and blue daypack. It had two really dried up
granola bars which I ate. The girl's name was written on the pack: Karolyn
Cole. There are no bones in the cave so I guess she got out. Maybe she had
a rope or ice tools to climb out. There was also a diary in the pack. I
read some of it. Evidently Karolyn and her brother Michael came to this
cave looking for their father who was also lost on the mountain. My
flashlight was getting dim so I stopped reading. Now I'm writing near the
cave entrance by moonlight.